After spending the last afternoon working with Melty it felt nice when Raphtalia came over the next day so I could do what I really wanted to do- which was stream!

Raphtlaia was eager as ever and her performance was actually improving- it seemed she actually understood some things about the game though we were still playing Bronze so it wasn't completely out of character for her to forget something. If anything we could use this as an opportunity to show people how much she had grown later on.

After three hours we were done and it was about as successful as our last stream the other week. We certainly weren't hitting meteoric records or going viral but that wasn't to be expected with only three videos. I was pretty sure that in the coming few months we would eventually have a video moment that would become very famous and then launch Raphtalia to stardom- but this was not that stream.

"Mr. Naofumi, are we doing good?" Raphtalia asked.

"We're doing good enough for now," I said. "We're going steady, that is to say. What we need is for one video or clip to go viral."

"Is there a way that we can make that happen?" Raphtalia asked.

"Not really- no one can predict when something'll go viral," I told her. "Channels usually don't grow linearly, if I were to explain it mathematically. They grow in leaps and bounds- one day, one of the clips or matches of you playing will become really famous. But, we can't ever know when or why." Even when I had been running my own channel- there were times were for no apparent reason a video did massively well. As a matter of fact, till this day, I had no idea why one of the videos I had made had gotten so many views- while there were videos that I thought would do well but barely got noticed.

I went and I started making something. I had bought some new ingredients just because I knew that Raphtalia was visiting.

I was even trying a new recipe- something I'd seen on one of those cooking shows. It was a kind of pasta with mixed red and white sauce- though I had been forced to substitute some of the ingredients because they were far too expensive. It took a bit of finagling, but I was able to make do with substitutes in a satisfying manner.

Raphtalia was looking at the stove intently- it seemed the smell, or rather the aroma of my cooking had really begun to get to her.

While that made me happy it once again raised the question in my mind- was my cooking really that good?

I really doubted it.

I was done, had set the table, and we were about to dig in when Raphtalia suddenly jumped up and pointed out the window.

"Mr. Naofumi there's someone outside," Raphtalia said.

She pointed out the window and I barely made my way there to see there was a strange shadow- or rather a figure which I could just barely make out racing across the front yard. Unfortunately, from my vantage point, I couldn't get a good luck at who- or what it was.

"Is it the person that's been following us? " I asked no one. "Well in that case let me have a word with them." I opened up the door and to my surprise, Raphtalia was following right behind me as I raced down the stairs and went to the front of the building.

Unfortunately, I could not see anyone there.

"Where do you think they went?" Raphtalia asked.

"I'm not sure," I said. "I don't know what to do anymore."

Eventually, the two of us just got tired of looking and then left. If we couldn't find the person who was responsible there was little that we could do.

Dejected, we went back into the house.

Now, in my rush to leave, I had left the door open. And Raphtalia hadn't bothered closing it either.

This would normally not have been a problem as my neighborhood was safe and I wasn't afraid of being burgled or anything like that.

But that meant that it was easy for someone to walk inside.

"This thing tastes amazing!" a girl said.

Both of us did a double-take.

"Who are you? " I asked her. The girl was... weird in many ways. For one she didn't even look remotely Japanese. She had long locks of flowing blonde hair and deep azure eyes.

"Filo is Filo, " the girl said. She was clearly a foreigner- but she was able to speak Japanese almost perfectly. At least as perfectly as you would expect a child around her age to speak. She looked to be about the same age as Melty. She was munching on past- the past I had made for Raphtalia and myself.

However, the theft of my food did not bother me as much as it should have. We had bigger fish to fry. Namely, why a young girl like this was in my house in the first place.

"How did she get in? " I asked.

"Filo walked in through the front door, " the girl said, still too busy eating to actually answer properly. As a matter of fact, while eating she spilled some sauce over her dress. She was a bit of a sloppy eater- why was she eating like she had not eaten in several days? Her dress looked to be pretty fancy though I had to admit it was not something you would expect a normal kid to wear. It looked like a party dress.

"Okay-" I began, trying very hard not to lose my patience and start yelling. "Where are your parents?" When she didn't answer that, I asked again, "Where is your mommy? Or daddy?"

She thought long and hard about it for a second.

"She is my mommy, " the girl said and pointed at Raphtalia.

I immediately turned my head towards Raphtalia- well this girl did look like a foreigner but I have to say that she didn't look similar to Raphtalia at all. They didn't even have the same eye or hair color. But could it be though that she was actually Raphtalia's daughter? It didn't look like she was old enough to have a child that age-

"No- no way!" Raphtlia practically screamed. Her face had turned bright red."I haven't even... done the things that would lead one to have a child! "

I still looked at her suspiciously.

"Hey you're thinking something rude again aren't you ?" she asked while glaring at me.

Perhaps I had attributed Raphtalia's talent to some kind of mind-reading powers but very honestly I had a feeling that my facial expression said it all this time.

A/N: Season 4 anime of the Shield Hero has been announced! Let's go!